Press Review

“Chorrord Inknishkhanutyun” comments on a Nagorno-Karabakh official’s remark that no agreements reached in Armenian-Azerbaijani negotiations can be put into practice without Stepanakert’s involvement and consent. The paper says the Armenian has side has not publicly used this “secret trump card” before. “Of course, it sounds nice, but it can be inferred from this that the negotiating process is developing under such an unpleasant scenario that we have to use that trump card now,” it says.

“Negotiations will have a logical development when Azerbaijan readily accepts the Artsakh people’s right to self-determination and the status of liberated Armenian territories,” Artak Zakarian, a parliament deputy from the ruling Republican Party of Armenia (HHK), tells “Hayots Ashkhar.” Without such a recognition, he says, “any settlement would be artificial and fruitless.” “The lands-for-security formula can not work. Only the force-for-force formula can,” adds Zakarian.

Speaking to “168 Zham,” Ashot Manucharian, a prominent politician, accuses Armenia’s and Karabakh’s leaders of having “disregarded” Armenian refugees from Azerbaijan and their problems. “With this behavior, we have prodded Azerbaijan to distort the essence of the problem and to say that there are no Armenian refugees, that there are only occupied Azerbaijani territories and Azerbaijani refugees,” says one of the leaders of the 1988 movement for Karabakh’s reunification with Armenia.

Gagik Minasian, another HHK lawmaker who chairs the Armenian parliament’s committee on finance and budgetary affairs, assures “Aravot” that Armenia’s economy is becoming competitive, even in comparison with Azerbaijan’s. “Obviously, the lion’s share of Azerbaijan’s economy comes from oil,” he says. “But authoritative international organizations say that the oil boom will go down starting from 2012.” “Azerbaijan’s glitz will give way to misery,” claims Minasian. “The situation is not like that in our country. In our country, serious investments are made into various sectors. The economy is being increasingly diversified, and this is the main lesson that we have learned from the economic crisis.”

In an interview with “Kapital,” former parliament speaker Tigran Torosian criticizes a government-drafted bill allowing for foreign-language schools in Armenia. Torosian dismisses government claims that such schools would help to boost education standards. “Clearly, it is not possible to solve this problem with such steps,” he says.